Pope Benedict XVI has decided the collection taken up at his Holy Thursday evening Mass will be used to help support the Catholic community in the Gaza Strip.

The Pope is an ex-member of the Hitler Youth and recently let a holocaust denier back into the Catholic Church. A revolting man but he has done some good with this move. Hopefully it is not motivated by his none to latent anti-semitism.

A foundation devoted to the memory of veteran Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat said on Monday it will open a new investigation into his mysterious death in 2004.

"The committee will include Arab doctors responsible for Arafat's health before he was moved to Paris and a number of political officials," Nasser al-Qidwa, Arafat's nephew who heads the foundation, told reporters.

The Nobel Peace Prize winner who led the struggle for Palestinian statehood for nearly four decades died in a French military hospital on November 11 after being airlifted there from his headquarters in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

At the time of Arafat's death at the age of 75, Palestinian officials alleged he had been poisoned by long-time foe Israel, but an inconclusive Palestinian investigation in 2005 ruled out cancer, AIDS and poisoning.

Israeli occupation forces on Monday fired at a group of Palestinian farmers who were tending to their farms near the northern Gaza Strip city of Beit Hanun wounding one of them.

Security and medical sources said that Abdullah Al-Za'nin, 19, was moderately wounded in the shooting.

The sources pointed out that the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) soldiers intermittently fire at farmers and citizens who try to reach their lands near the security fence separating the Gaza Strip from Palestine occupied in 1948.

Meanwhile, IOF bulldozers on Sunday started paving the way for the construction of a bypass road for the settlers of the Sahve Shamron settlement near Deir Sharaf village west of Nablus city.

The IOF troops had confiscated 78 dunums of Palestinian citizens' land near the village to construct the 12-meter wide road.

250 settlers live in the settlement, which also accommodates an IOF base.

In Canada, a federal judge has refused an injunction to force the Canadian government to allow George Galloway to speak at a series of meetings.

We're asking everyone to follow the example of Gerry Hawke. He donated $20 to Viva Palestina, which is accused by the Canadian government of supporting terrorism because it sent aid to Gaza, and has turned himself in to the police, challenging them to prosecute him!

to donate to the special fund to fight Kenney's political ban and to support Viva Palestina's political campaigning work to lift the siege of Gaza. If you're sick of illiberal, pro-war policies – help fund opposition to them. Follow Gerry's example of donating and then letting the authorities know what you've done. Gerry also wrote to his local newspaper letting them know - all of which helps not only to show the minister's actions up for what they were, but also to keep Gaza alive in the media.

We've been overwhelmed by the level of support for George, both from friends and from people who disagree with him but think it's outrageous that George Bush was allowed to travel freely in Canada, but George Galloway isn't even allowed to cross the border.

Please support the Viva Palestina campaign financially if you can, and please keep making your voice heard.